THE RED DEER 
are much heavier in body, but distinctly inferior in horn, to those of the 
adjoining county of Ross. In most years the heaviest stag in Scotland 
will weigh from 20 st. to 22 st. — 30 st. clean (the weight of a stag 
killed many years ago at Beaufort) being the heaviest of which I have 
any record.* Even in English parks such a weight has seldom been attained, 
32 st. clean being the heaviest Warnham stag. 
The following are the measurements of a very large Highland stag 
which had been imported into an English park: 
Length from nose to end of tail, 80 inches. 
Circumference behind the shoulders, 55 inches. 
Standing height, 46 inches. 
The horns of the male Red deer make their appearance when the animal 
is from eight to ten months old. In the wild race they are straight and 
simple spikes, about 4 to 7 inches long, with a small coronet. In a park, 
I have often seen young deer with six and seven points on the snags, 
and once one with nine, a remarkable pricket indeed, which had no fewer 
than nineteen points on his second pair of horns. In wild deer only the 
brow point is usually added in the second year, and afterwards the points 
grow according to the particular type of antlers inherited from the parents. 
After the brows are added, some wild stags never have any additional 
points, though the main beam may grow to a considerable length. These 
are known as “ switch horns ” by stalkers, and they are often the largest 
and fattest deer. 
In wild stags we most commonly see eight points at four years old and 
twelve points at six. But there is no hard-and-fast rule, for wild stags 
are often small royals at four years old. It is somewhat unusual to find 
wild Scottish stags with more than twelve points, but on Exmoor and in 
Ireland stags with fourteen are not uncommon. 
Horn growth is largely a matter of food, shelter and variety of range, 
chemical contents of the soil, and the conditions under which the deer 
live. It is not surprising that in pre-historic, and even early historic 
times, when the wild deer lived under far better conditions, both in the 
Highland forests and the woods of England and Ireland, they should have 
developed antlers far superior to those of to-day; but this was due prin- 
cipally to the small stock of deer that there was in former times, and 
to the fact that their range was never curtailed. As a matter of fact red 
* Mr Grlmble mentions a Speyside stag of 33 stone, but I can obtain no satisfactory evidence that this weight 
was correct. 
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